THE 



CANADIAN RECORD 



OF SCIENCE. 



^4£^^^ 



VOL. II. OCTOBER, 1886. NO. 4. 



Presidential Address before the British Asso- 

 ciation for the Advancement of Science, 

 Sept. 1886. 



By Sir J. William Dawson, 



C.M.G., M.A., LL.D., F.R.S., F.G.S., Principal and Vice-Chancellor of 

 McGill University, Montreal, Canada. 



Twenty-one years have passed away since the last meet- 

 ing of the British Association in this great central city of 

 England. At the third Birmingham meeting — that of 

 1865 — 1 had the pleasure of being present, and had the 

 honour of being one of the Vice-Presidents of the Geological 

 Section. At that meeting, my friend John Phillips, one of 

 the founders of the Association, occupied the Presidential 

 chair, and I cannot better introduce what I have to say this 

 evening than by quoting the eloquent words with which he 

 then opened his address : — ' Assembled for the third time 

 in this busy centre of industrious England, amid the roar 

 of engines and clang of hammers, where the strongest pow- 

 ers of nature are trained to work in the fairy chains of art, 



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